They have hand built a few cabins and "treehouses". Some are private and some are dorm style. They also have a staff of about 5 or 6 internationals that help them run the place for free room and board. On Sundays they have an afternoon BBQ with a little band, hamburgers, beer and shuttles that bring people up and down from Antigua. It was a great little time and after most of the revellers returned to civilization, they have a family style dinner for the guests, workers and anyone else that has missed a ride or decided to crash in a hammock (costing a whopping $3). They compost everything and really try to make a positive impact on the local community. During happy hour they donate 1 quetzal of each drink to the local elementary school. They also do volunteer projects with the school, trying to improve their quality of teachers and donate supplies for the classroom. It was a very good time in a killer setting. I will say that, once the sun went down, it got really cold. I went to bed around 9pm and jumped under the covers. It must have gotten down to 32 degrees with the wind ripping through the trees. Luckily they had tons of blankets on the beds.
My pillowcase had a picture of a Ferrari on it. If you look closely at the picture below, you can see it.
Needless to say I dreamt of driving fast cars, being blown off the mountain roads by hurricane force winds. Amazingly each time the Ferrari I was driving was blown so far off the moutainside that it landed on the next road without losing a beat. I slept like a little kid.
This afternoon I went for a hike by myself in the surrounding mountains. They say it is very safe, as the locals know that any white boy, like myself, that happens to be walking the trails of the mountains must be staying at the "casa de los gringos". Since the hippies here do so much for the local school and employ 4 or 5 locals for cleaning and cooking, the locals are allright with gringos. Good thing too, cuz when I rounded the corner in a bit of forrest and saw an old man hacking at the foliage with his machete, I had second thoughts of hiking by myself. He was really happy to see me though, even offered me half of his orange. I politefully declined but felt compelled to offer him some of my water, which he poiltefully refused. Then we parted ways and I couldn't help but chuckle a bit. After I met my machete weilding friend I came upon a local coffee finca (plantation). Apparently this particular plantation is owned by one of the old money families in the area. The overseer's daughter is employed by the hippie hotel as well, so I felt like I was in like Flynn. I ran into this overseer and he told where a cool overlook was, where a nice bench was. A good resting point on the hike. He also told me to keep an eye on Volcan Fuego, which had been belching up some ash at regular intervals all day. Walking through the coffee finca was super cool. The grounds were immaculate and each coffee plant had tons of little red and orange beans inside their full, bushy green leaves. I made way way back to the hippie hotel, stopping to see the volcano burp up ash along the way. The name of the hippie hotel, by the way, is Earth Lodge. Besides the name, I have no complaints.
